We decided to find out what would happen if we didn't sleep for a week.
First day
If a person does not sleep for a day, then this will not cause any serious consequences for his health, however, a long period of wakefulness will lead to a malfunction of the circadian cycle, which is determined by the setting of a person's biological clock.
Scientists believe that about 20 thousand neurons in the hypothalamus are responsible for the biological rhythms of the body. This is the so-called suprachiasmatic nucleus.
Circadian rhythms are synchronized with the 24-hour light cycle of day and night and are associated with brain activity and metabolism, so even a daily delay in sleep will lead to a slight disruption in the functioning of body systems.
If a person does not sleep for a day, then, firstly, he will feel tired, and secondly, he may have problems with memory and attention. This is due to dysfunction of the neocortex, which is responsible for memory and learning ability.
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Second-third day
If a person does not go to bed for two or three days, then fatigue and memory problems will add to a lack of coordination in movements, serious problems with concentration of thoughts and concentration of vision will begin to arise. Due to the exhaustion of the nervous system, a nervous tic may appear.
Due to a disturbance in the work of the frontal lobe of the brain, a person will begin to lose the ability to creatively think and focus on a task, his speech will become monotonous, clichéd.
In addition to the "brain" complications, the person's digestive system will also begin to "rebel". This is due to the fact that a long period of wakefulness activates the protective evolutionary mechanism "fight or flight" in the body.
A person's production of leptin will increase and his appetite will increase (with an addiction to salty and fatty foods), the body, in response to a stressful situation, will start the function of storing fats and producing hormones responsible for insomnia. Strange as it may seem, it will be difficult for a person to fall asleep during this period, even if he wants to.
Fourth to fifth day
On the fourth or fifth day without sleep, a person may begin to appear hallucinations, he will become extremely irritable. After five days without sleep, the work of the main parts of the brain will slow down in a person, and neural activity will be extremely weak.
Serious violations will be observed in the parietal zone, which is responsible for logic and mathematical abilities, so solving even the simplest arithmetic problems will be an overwhelming task for a person.
Due to violations in the temporal lobe, which is responsible for speech abilities, a person's speech will become even more incoherent than on the third day without sleep.
The hallucinations already mentioned will begin to occur due to a malfunction of the prefrontal cortex.
Sixth-seventh days
On the sixth or seventh day without sleep, a person will be little like himself at the beginning of this sleepless marathon. His behavior will be extremely strange, hallucinations will be both visual and auditory.
The official record holder for insomnia, American student Randy Gardner (did not sleep for 254 hours, 11 days), on the sixth day without sleep developed syndromes typical of Alzheimer's disease, had severe hallucinations and paranoia.
He took the road sign for a person and believed that the radio station presenter wanted to kill him.
Gardner had a severe tremor of the limbs, he could not speak coherently, solving simple problems puzzled him - he simply forgot what he had just been told and what the task was.
By the seventh day without sleep, the body will experience serious stress on all systems of the body, brain neurons will be inactive, the heart muscle is worn out, immunity due to the passivity of T-lymphocytes will almost cease to resist viruses and bacteria, the liver will experience enormous stress.
In general, such health experiments are extremely dangerous.